New Ac/dc Album Is A Model Of Consistency

You've been wondering, probably, why they've been playing some AC/DC song on MTV lately.

Is it some revival along the lines of Queen a few years back? Part of that big '80s nostalgia thing? Something to do with the constant plug on Beavis and Butt-head T-shirts?

Why else on earth would Angus Young be out there again, stomping around, slamming power chords in short pants?

Well, it happens to be the new AC/DC single, ``Hard as a Rock,'' the band's first new studio release since the triple platinum ``The Razors Edge'' album five years ago.

But how will we be able to tell the new ``Ballbreaker,'' out in stores today, from any old AC/DC album? That's the limitation and the glory of the Australian hard-rock mainstays. No matter how some things change in rock, AC/DC stays reliably the same.

But there are some changes on the Rick Rubin-produced album, insists Brian Johnson, the gritty- voiced lead singer, over the phone from New York.

``There are some styles of singing I hadn't done before,'' Johnson says in an Aussie accent quite different from his frantic on-stage scream. `` `Boogie Man' is down low and bluesy. `Ballbreaker' is in a key I hadn't sung in before.''

Still, there's hardly a note on the album that wouldn't identify the band, which has sold more than 25 million albums since 1989 in America alone and was recently honored by having two songs included in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Museum's 500 greatest rock 'n' roll songs of all time -- ``Back in Black'' and ``Highway to Hell.''

There's certainly a whole new world of rock out there, Johnson agrees, and not much of a platform for the kind of crunch rockers who dominated in the '80s.

If radio is initially skeptical of playing the new album, Johnson says, it won't be for long. ``If an album sells, and people like it, they have to play it. Not just for us but for the advertisers. That's nice when you're forced to play it, and the people are telling them.''

Following that logic, he adds, ``We're the only alternative band left. We're the only ones left going out against the mainstream.''

``Ballbreaker'' marks the return of original drummer Phil Rudd after an absence of 10 years.

But when AC/DC played New Zealand toward the end of the 1990- 91 tour documented on the bestselling ``Live'' album in 1992, Rudd showed up again.

When the band got back together in London after a year's break, Rudd was in town by coincidence. ``He popped around to see us,'' Johnson says. ``Me and Malcolm [Young] and Angus were there. And we said, `There's the kit in the corner. Let's have a jam for old times sake.' ''

As soon as he did, Johnson said, he was back in the band for good.

Rudd had been replaced by Simon Wright first and then Chris Slade. There were no hard feelings from Slade, says Johnson. ``Chris was a great drummer. But it wasn't a case of who was best. It was that we wanted that sound back. Chris knew he was a hired gun from the start.''

As for the wild guitar antics of Angus Young, it doesn't look like things will change when the band goes on tour early next year. Despite the preponderance of flannel and rags on tour, Young will continue to wear his crushed-velvet schoolboy's costume, even as he turns 35 next year.